Swizz Beatz Details Experience At Harvard Business School

After moving onto a career in music directly following his high-school graduation, Hip Hop producer Swizz Beatz is now attending the Harvard University Business School. Swizz Beatz, who is 35 years old, follows in the footsteps of other industry professionals like Antonio “L.A.” Reid as a student in the Harvard Business School’s Owner/President Management Extension Program according to Billboard.

The Harvard Business School program that Swizz Beatz plans to complete hinges on a nine-week course requirement.

On top of his production credits for artists like Nas, Ludacris, Jadakiss, and Jay Z, Swizz Beatz has also served as a fashion and shoe designer for several brands.

According to Billboard, the HBS program Swizz Beatz is currently attending comes at a price of $33,000 per credit. By the end of the program, Swizz’s Harvard education will represent a cost of at least $100,000. Nonetheless, the producer’s tab at Harvard is supported by a scholarship.

Speaking with The Breakfast Club Morning Show earlier this week, Swizz Beatz detailed his motivation to return to school and the experience of living in the Massachusetts’ school’s dorm.

“I just felt like you have to keep graduating your brand,” he said. “A lot of people get complacent with their success and things that they’ve done before and I just wasn’t comfortable with that because I started transitioning from producer to business owner. I would be in these rooms and, no matter how big the deal was or how good it is, people would still look at me like ‘Oh, he’s the rapper guy. He’s the rapper friend.’ I’m like, ‘We all in this meeting because of what I’m bringing to the table.’ But being that I didn’t really have any credentials to go with those different things, I didn’t feel like I was getting the respect that I deserved. So I said, ‘You know what, let me go and sharpen my pencil a little bit and really walk back in these rooms a different person and different man.’”

Swizz Beatz also attributed his return to school to an industry filled with “smoke and mirrors.”

“I’m an owner,” he said. “You know we want things so bad that we will take anything just to have a title, but after you do the ratios and the math, does that title really mean anything? I’m just tired of the smoke and mirrors. I want to be an owner for real. Be apart of IPO’s for real. Have veto rights, have seats on the board and do things for real because a lot of our industry got a lot of potential but we’re not really exercising it.”